Morphometric study of the cerebellum cortex of the albino rats treated with pregabalin drug during the postnatal period

Abstract EN

The cerebellum is the largest part of the mammalian hindbrain; it was the dynamic portion of the vertebrate central nervous system that has highly complex but orderly organization.

The cerebellum cortex has a striking morphology consisting of folia and fissures and variety of cells morphologically and functionally, so it considered an ideal system to study the development of the central nervous model in the mammals in both prenatal and postnatal periods.

The ontogenesis of the cerebellum in the mammals takes place along period of the development from the embryogenesis to the postnatal time after delivery to reach to the morphologically and physiologically maturity form, therefore these stages are very critical and sensitive to any internal or external effects that may be occur during the growth more than the mature cerebellum, like drugs, pesticides, and other environmental agents.

The antiepileptic drugs which are used in the control and treatment many neurological disorders or as analgesic agents in the infants, children and pregnant women like epilepsy are one of the most drugs that have harmful effects on the growth and development of the nervous system, Pregabalin (PGB) (Lyrica®) is the last generation of the antiepileptic medications.

The study was aimed to deal with the quantitative assessment of the toxicity effect of the Pregabalin drug on the postnatal development of the cerebellum of the albino rats.

The results of the morphometric assessment of the postnatal development in this study showed the weight of the developing cerebellum increased normally in the control neonates, while in the treated neonates with PGB, the results showed significant (P<0.05) decreased in the weight especially after postnatal 15 with unstable levels of the weight of the cerebellum.

The other morphometric results of the area, perimeter of the cerebellum in the treated group with PGB were showed significant (P<0.05) decreased when compared with the control group.

While the measurements of the anterior-posterior diameter (APD)and transverse diameter (TD) values indicated the toxic effect of the PGB on the development of the cerebellum cortex during Postnatal stages, The previous results indicate that the low antiepileptic dose of the Pregabalin (150 mg/kg B.wt/ day) may be safer to use by the pregnant women with certain neurological diseases as epilepsy than the other higher doses (300 and 600 mg/kg B.wt/ day) on the embryonic development of the cerebellum.